Louise’s Story: “Since Then I Carry Pepper Spray Everywhere I Go”

I got on the Fraser bus to go home from school and as soon as I sat down there was this man sitting in front of me, late 30’s early 40’s maybe. Anyways, I could tell right away from the way he was looking at me that he was bad news (I’ve had to deal with lots of creeps before, but he was the worst), as he kept staring at me incessantly with a very strange glare in his eyes. As soon as I could, I moved seats on the bus but he kept following me. When I reached my stop, he got off as well, he even stood up right when I did. Then he started following me home, and I decided it was better not to lead him there, so I took a different route, all the while this creep is following only 3 feet behind me.

I turned into an alley and grabbed the only thing in my bag I could find to defend myself, then I confronted him and asked if he was following me. Then he started to say things like, “Please, don’t do this, I love you, please.” I have never met this man before in my life. I’ve taken self defense courses before and at this point I decided to get aggresive to scare him. I picked up some rocks, started screaming for him to get the f*** away from me but he wouldn’t so I picked up more rocks and he started to walk back slowly, but with this demented smile that made me feel really nervous. I then turned and ran when he was far enough away and ran into some more a**holes who pulled up next to me in a car and asked me if I wanted to party (I mean seriously, where do all these jerks come from), but I ignored them and kept walking. Luckily I ran into my brother shortly after, and he walked me home. Then I called the police to report the stalker but I don’t think they ever found out who he is. Since then I carry pepper spray everywhere I go.